Terry Wogan has extended his ratings lead over breakfast radio rival Chris Moyles while BBC Radio 4 has hit a 10-year listener high, official Rajar listening figures published today revealed.

Wogan, who is leaving his BBC Radio 2 show at the end of the year to be replaced by Chris Evans, retained his status as the country's favourite breakfast DJ as Moyles lost almost 700,000 listeners over the summer, the data showed.

He had an average weekly audience of 7.75 million in the third quarter of the year, down 174,000 on the previous quarter.

Moyles lost 679,000 listeners over the same period. His audience fell to 7.04 million, putting him 718,000 adrift of Wogan compared with a 213,000 gap in the second quarter.

Overall, it was a good quarter for Radio 2, with reach up and audience share bouncing back from a three-year low last time around.

The station remained Britain's favourite, with a weekly reach – the number of listeners who tune in for at least five minutes a week – of 13.62 million, up 1.5% from the second quarter and 4.3% better year on year.

Its share of the audience increased to 15.9% from 15.5% the previous quarter, although this was still down on last year's 16%.

Radio 1, however, lost reach to record 11.11 million listeners in the third quarter, down 2% on the previous quarter but up 2.2% from a year ago.

Its share dropped to 9.9% from 10.3%, although this was fractionally better than the 9.8% recorded in 2008.

Radio 4 recorded its highest listener numbers since 1999 in the third quarter of the year, with a weekly reach of 10.21 million, up 2.2% from just under 10 million in the second quarter of the year and up 8.1% on the same period last year.

It was the first time since the first quarter of 2003 that the station had broken through the 10 million listener mark.

Its audience share of 12.4% - up from 12.1% in the previous quarter and 11.5% a year ago - was its joint second best in the past decade, just below the 12.5% recorded in the first quarter of this year.

Insiders believe the station may have benefited from a greater interest in serious news and current affairs coverage during the recession.

The Today programme gained 95,000 listeners on the previous quarter to reach 6.60 million listeners – an increase of nearly half a million on the same time last year.

"Radio 4 goes from strength to strength," Tim Davie, the BBC's director of audio and music, said. "In offering radio of the highest quality, it is both delighting loyal listeners and attracting inquisitive new audiences."

Radio 3 also did well, recording its highest reach for five years as it benefited from listeners tuning in to Proms concerts over the summer.

The classical music station had 2.19 million listeners, up 8.5% on the previous quarter and up 12.6% year on year.

Its drivetime show In Tune, with Sean Rafferty, recorded an 11% rise in reach on the second quarter and was up 24% year on year.

Radio 3's share rose to 1.4% as a result, up from 1.2% in the previous quarter and the same level a year earlier.

News and sports station Radio 5 Live slipped back slightly on the previous quarter when it recorded its best reach since 2004.

Some 6.39 million people tuned in, excluding listeners to the digital-only service Five Live Sports Extra. That was down 0.4% on the previous quarter, but up a hefty 9.6% year on year.

But with listeners tuning in for more time, its share improved to 4.9% from 4.5% in the previous quarter and 4.6% in the same period last year.

The BBC's total share of the audience was 55.0%, up from 54.6% in the previous three months and 54.9% a year ago.

With commercial radio taking a 42.4% share of listening – down from 42.7% in the previous quarter and 43.1% in the same period in 2008 – the corporation had an overall advantage of 12.6%, up from its lead of 11.9% in the second quarter and 11.8% in the third quarter of 2008.

The BBC's lead over commercial radio remained at the 15.7% margin it achieved in the first three months of last year.